


Harry Potter and the Aftermath of the Tale of the Three Brothers

by hymns_to_alien_stars



Series: Harry Potter and the Aftermath [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Death as an Original Character, Family Dynamics, Gen, The Tale of the Three Brothers (Harry Potter)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-18 18:41:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29613762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hymns_to_alien_stars/pseuds/hymns_to_alien_stars
Summary: It does not happen often when Death talks to someone in particular and that someone is alive. Though, as far as Deaths go, this is quite an unconventional one.
Series: Harry Potter and the Aftermath [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2154303
Comments: 6
Kudos: 21





	Harry Potter and the Aftermath of the Tale of the Three Brothers

Harry studied the ceiling at the Great Hall with a distant sort of nostalgia. He remembered being in awe at eleven, he remembered restoring this building to its glory after the Battle. He remembered being stared at, both of those occasions. Now he was this strange Potter kid who popped out of nowhere to be in sixth year, which meant that he was a subject of intense stares once again.

The only thing different now, he supposed, that he wasn’t towering above the first years alone.

He took another glance at the girl on his left that stood unbothered by attention in a way that reminded him of Luna, even though she looked nothing like her. The girl had chin-length dark hair and black eyes and if she should remind Harry of anyone, it should have been Snape. If you disregard the facial features, she was a slightly shorter, slightly more appearance-conscious and very much female version of Severus Snape.

“Potter, Harry!” said the Headmaster, no, Deputy Headmaster Dumbledore.

Honestly, if someone showed Harry the photo of the current Albus Dumbledore and the photo of the Albus Dumbledore he knew in his school days, he would have never guessed they were the same person. Albus Dumbledore should be  _ old _ , have white hair and long beard and a twinkle in his pale blue eyes.

Well, he was nothing like that and Harry tried not to stare on his way to the Sorting Hat.

Then, he heard a familiar voice inside his head and tried to shield everything incriminating with all the Auror Occlumency training that he had to go through in the crash course and then supplement here and there.

“Ah, a Potter, so soon…” Harry tensed. “Calm down, boy, your shields might be passable but I was made to read minds. You are clever enough but do not seek knowledge for its own sake and your loyalty does not yet truly belong to anyone. But since your secrets are so important to you, I can think only of one House for you… SLYTHERIN!”

Harry honestly didn’t know what to expect from the Sorting but, in hindsight, it was obvious: he was not Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw material, and Gryffindor was a dream from the start. Thankfully, there wasn’t yet such a stigma on being Slytherin, so his adoptive parents and brothers wouldn’t disown him right there. Besides, they were Parselmouths, so Slytherin seemed pretty fitting to him.

When he came to take his seat at the table, his classmates shuffled around, looking at the Potter that might have been raised by squibs or be a result of a scandalous affair with an intense curiosity but didn’t say anything, instead turning to watch for the remaining student to be Sorted.

“Verell, Persephone,” read Dumbledore, sounding not sure where to put the emphasis on the surname.

The girl version of Snape (could she be his ancestor or something?) spent under the Hat a full second before it shouted, “RAVENCLAW!”

Harry caught her looking at him before she went to her table. Strange, but maybe she felt uncomfortable, being only one of the two sixteen-year-olds being Sorted. Harry didn’t remember if it ever happened while he was at Hogwarts.

The only classes Harry struggled to get to were Arithmancy and Transfiguration, since he had never been to the former and the latter was taught in a different classroom than he remembered. The Verell girl, however, had too little trouble finding places for someone who supposedly had never been to Hogwarts. Was Harry being paranoid? Maybe.

She sat next to him in Arithmancy and made no notes, simply listening to the lecture, while Harry scrambled to get everything on paper since his magical math skills were passable at best for OWLs (he’d probably fail his NEWTs if Folly insisted on doing them instead of OWLs; Auror job had very little to do with what he studied at Hogwarts) and Harry had no idea what to do with himself if he couldn’t become an Auror again.

Transfiguration was strange and not because of the struggle not to use non-verbal or simplified versions of the spells (Harry was too used to casting to need textbook movements and words). He only got an O in the first place because Rose was interested in the field and they often talked about it, in letters and in person, otherwise Harry would forget a good chunk of it by the time he was twenty years out of school.

Transfiguration was strange because it was taught by Albus Dumbledore.

He was ginger, for one. Not Weasly-level of ginger but ginger nevertheless. His robes were not as impressive as in Harry’s time, the clashing colours didn’t yet burn your eyes but the patterns showed Dumbledore was only in the beginning of developing his own brand of eccentricity. Well, he was, what, in his late thirties?

Harry tried to imagine himself being only twenty years younger than Dumbledore by the time the twenty-first century started and couldn’t, which wasn’t really a surprise since he was technically forever frozen at seventeen. Would he start wearing bright purple at some point too?

Harry snorted and got a reprimanding glance from a fellow Slytherin for his amusement.

In the next second, his amusement evaporated by the sudden realisation that he actually  _ was  _ Dumbledore’s age, and more experienced in fighting to boot. God, it was bizarre.

Harry played out the duel between Voldemort and Dumbledore at the Ministry, trying not to think about the context. At that time, it was a spectacular show of magical power and skills. Now, Harry could point out weaknesses in their defence and style, maybe even give out a few pointers. His own manner of duelling was more Tom Riddle than Dumbledore, due to the latter’s mastery of Transfiguration: Harry  _ could  _ conjure animals to fight for him but they wouldn’t be half as impressive. Plus, Harry Potter and Tom Riddle both could use Parseltongue-specific spells in the open.

Harry was lost in thoughts of how he would duel a Transfiguration Master, when a sharp elbow was shoved into his ribs. He hissed in pain, got out of his daydream and stared right into the bright blue eyes of a said Transfiguration Master.

Please, Harry prayed, please tell me he didn’t see my thoughts right this moment.

“Mr Potter, five points from Slytherin for not paying attention,” Dumbledore chastised his student. “Demonstrate the Bird-Conjuring Charm for us.”

Harry took his wand out and said clearly, “Avis.” A blast and the flock of canaries instantly reminded him of Hermione and he swallowed, trying not to give any emotion out.

Professor Dumbledore nodded. “Good, Mr Potter. Now vanish them  _ nonverbally _ .”

Harry blushed; of course, they studied nonverbal casting in the sixth year too. The canaries disappeared with a chirp.

Dumbledore twinkled at him. “Excellent, Mr Potter, two points  _ to  _ Slytherin but try a bit harder to pay attention in class.”

Harry breathed out when the professor turned his back and returned to the blackboard. He had no excuse for spacing out except for the fact that he could manage all of the spells nonverbally and, most of them, with a modified wand movement: for Avis he could only give an indistinct wave and it would work, it would even work with a flick, simply because he worked with magic as long as Dumbledore at this point.

Hermione could do wandless conjurations just because she practised it enough and was sure of her skills. She said it was like drawing - after enough attempts, she didn’t need to look up tutorials, other people’s examples or look at the actual thing to draw some objects perfectly.

Harry didn’t think it was like drawing at all but what did he know, he never really tried.

The girl was sitting next to him in Arithmancy, which was suspicious enough on its own. But…

“Would you like my help?” she asked, nonchalantly, about a series of equations Harry was stuck on.

They were extra, for ‘those who strive’, and Harry was forty, damnit, and completely, hopelessly, frustratingly stuck.

“Yeah,” he relented. “I mean, please.”

The girl - Persephone? - smiled and took his parchment. She looked through his solution, then her own. “Oh,” Persephone said happily. “You just wrote it down incorrectly, here.” She put her finger on it - and yes, he did: he misplaced a bracket.

Harry put his hand over his eyes. “Thank you… I probably wouldn’t have even noticed.”

“Persephone.” She offered her hand. “You can call me Percy.”

Harry shook it. Persephone was nothing like Percy Weasly but, really, Percy himself changed very much over the years, though predictably.

After that day, the girl stuck by him as if they were friends. She came to him at lunch and dinner to chat about Arithmancy, endure long uncomfortable pauses in conversation and turn every attempt to talk about Quidditch into an academic discussion.

No wonder Charlus didn’t like her.

Charlus stuck by Slytherin table for his own reasons, namely one Dorea Black who was a fifth year, a beater and a stoic girl that Charlus would one day marry if all went according to the previous timeline. She had dark brown hair, blue eyes and a black (pun intended) sense of humour that Charlus found edgy.

“You should try out for the team,” said Charlus excitedly. “Remember, Dorea, what I told you about the haunted snitch? Harry caught it, like, in ten minutes and we tried for  _ hours  _ and couldn’t!”

“Uh-huh,” said Dorea. Harry couldn’t understand whether she believed the poltergeist story or not. “We are not the seekers, though, I am a beater and you are not on the team.”

“I’m going to get a spot this year,” promised Charlus. “You will see.”

Dorea looked him up and down dramatically. “Maybe.” Charlus blushed. “Tryouts are this Saturday, Potter, but we have a pretty decent seeker already, you’ll have to do something incredibly impressive for us to take you in.”

And something impressive Harry did.

For a day, he fretted how unfair it was to pin forty-year-olds against teenagers but then his whole future life would be unfair and he might as well give up on doing anything. Besides, he was rusty. He wasn’t used to the brooms. And wasn’t age a disadvantage in sports?

He got all three practice snitches, avoided all the bludgers, got one over the current seeker - and got a reserve spot out of it, simply because the current one worked well with the current team (he played for sixth years already), and a practically guaranteed one next year. 

When Harry landed, Charlus jumped at him with congratulatory hugs.

Dorea said he was a pretty decent seeker himself. 

“Have you ever wondered about the Arithmancy calculations behind the snitch’s movements,” said Persephone, her eyes glinting with humour. Harry concluded that he simply did not understand what was so funny about academic non-sequiturs.

Hermione would probably get it.

For some reason, Harry was sure that his second life will be free of mysteries jumping out on him. He had to reevaluate that expectation when he saw a blunt “P. E. Verell” signature on Persephone’s letter.

He stared.

She raised her head, noticed him noticing and stared back, with a challenge. She calmly folded the letter and put it out in one of her notebooks. Harry wanted to say something, or maybe shout; they were in the library but not in one of its more secluded corners, and madam Pince was always listening.

On mutual agreement, they relocated to the corner near the window that was hidden behind the shelves. Harry cast privacy charms and turned to her, internally debating what to ask first.

“You are Master of Death, aren’t you?” the girl said, interrupting all his thought processes.

“What,” Harry tried to recover. “How- What do you mean?” Her tone was almost nonchalant and he pushed to fill his own with incredulity. “Who are you? Peverell…”

The girl blinked at him. “Oh,” she said, then stared out of the window, contemplating.

“Hey,” Harry stepped closer. “Don’t ignore me.”

Persephone, if that was indeed her name, return her eyes to him, “I thought you could recognise me. We will just have to do it differently, then.”

“Knew what? Do what differently?” said Harry, exasperated. His brain was allergic to cryptic messages.

“Hello,” the girl offered her hand. “I am Death. Nice to meet you.”

Harry didn’t shake her hand this time. “Do you mean 'Death’ like in the Peverell brothers’ tale?”

Persephone made a face. “If you have to think about it like that. I never gave my uncles any necromantic artefacts for them to be dead as soon as possible, though.”

Harry blinked. Uncles?.. “You are a kid of-”

“Cadmus Peverell, yes.” The girl paused, “The middle brother. The one with the Stone?”

“Is your name really Persephone?”

“Well no,” Not-Persephone tilted her head. “But my real name did get shorten to ‘Percy’. Nobody has used it for several centuries, though, even me.” She smiled. “I chose Persephone because of the myths… and the letter ‘P’. I thought I was being obvious with the surname already.” Death looked at him. “And you should have been able to notice me for who I am, at least from a corner of your eye. But you didn’t, did you?”

Harry thought about it. “I thought you were a bit strange but not being-Death level of strange, no.”

“Strange how?” Death asked with obvious curiosity.

“Doesn’t matter. Why did you say that I should have noticed?” She didn’t bring the scythe, she wasn’t a skeleton, she wasn’t surrounded by spirits of the dead.

“Oh, it’s the Master of Death thing,” she brushed it off.

“I see,” said Harry. He didn’t  _ see  _ anything. “Wait, can we get back to you being Death. Are there more than one of you? Or is the tale of the three brothers fake, or a metaphor, or something?”

“Well,” Death said slowly. “You see, being Death is pretty boring and that Death was working for thousands of years.” She sat on the windowsill. “He decided to come up with an entertainment: give out the three artefacts that, collected, gave one Master _ y _ of Death. As in, mastery like one can master Arithmancy. But that’s not really important.”

Harry frowned. Was the Master-without-y wishful thinking, got lost after a couple of generations?

Persephone waved her hand. “You see, he thought that the chase will entertain him for centuries to come. He gave out the artefacts to my uncles and went to take care of Death business.” She sighed. “Antioch was murdered for the wand. My father was obsessed with a woman who died and who wasn’t my mother. My brother gave up on him, and I… I was fifteen at that time and I thought that if he resurrected that woman, he’d be my father again.”

Harry moved from his position of leaning on the wall to sitting next to her on the windowsill. He didn’t know if he should comfort her, she seemed unmoved, staring into nothing.

“Father had a Stone but wasn’t getting any closer, just a shade. I was sure that if we had all the Hallows, we could get more - didn’t they promise Mastery of Death? I asked my uncle for the Cloak. I went hunting for the Wand, it didn’t take long, maybe half a year.”

There was silence. Harry shifted. If it ended the same way as the tale from his world...

She looked at him, black eyes as a still surface of the lake at night. “I was too late. I found his body, Stone in hand and all. And you know what Death said? That it was  _ unsatisfying _ .” Her voice is a mix of stale anger, resentment and acceptance.

Harry can’t think of anything other than, “I’m sorry.” He never knows what to say in situations like this.

Persephone turns from the window and smirks which makes something inside Harry cold. It’s not a nice smirk. “I spoiled his fun: all items collected within a year and by a fifteen-year-old to boot, and he gave a magical promise to give Mastery of Death to one who managed to do that.” She pointed at herself in a mocking gesture. “It’s interesting, actually, how the Hallows affect human perception. If you don’t want the knowledge or their power, you simply do not believe in their existence. Dumbledore - he wants and so he believes.” She shook her head. “And Voldemort from your world? He did not seek knowledge but power, and he didn’t believe in the Stone or the Cloak, only the Wand was real to him.”

Her words reminded Harry of others: ‘There’s only power and those too weak to seek it.’ Was the same true for knowledge of Death, was Voldemort too afraid to believe in other Hallows?

“Wait a second, how do you know about Voldemort?” Harry asked.

Death smiled. “Your problem with Occumency is that you only conjure them when you feel an attack. A really good Legilimens - and Death - can read your mind so that you don’t even notice.” 

Harry rolled his eyes. “Don’t read my mind, please. And how did you look me in the eyes for long enough? I’d notice  _ that _ .”

Percy’s smile grew wider. “I borrowed the Cloak from Fleamont.”

Harry shook his head in disbelief, imagining Death standing right in front of him, trying to look into his eyes, and himself being totally oblivious, staring into space.

“Anyway,” sighed Persephone. “Death was disappointed and irritated so he fulfilled the promise in the most straightforward way possible. He dumped the knowledge on me in one go, cursed the Wand so it’d be “more interesting next time”, returned the Hallows to their places before I collected them, and gave me his job. Haven’t seen him since. Probably took a vacation.”

Death took a vacation and put a fifteen-year-old in his position. Brilliant.

“Don’t think I’m complaining,” suddenly warned Persephone. “It’s sorta fun. I got to see how everything changed through millennia, and I know necromancy better than anyone now. I was studying to be one, back when…” She struggled to define it. “Back then.”

“You believed in Hallows so you wanted the knowledge and the power… Or does it not work like that in your case?” asked Harry.

“Hm,” Persephone tilted her head. “I never thought about it like that. I’ve heard the story first hand, my father and my uncles told me, so how could I not believe the Hallows were real? And I wanted to collect them to help my father, not to become a Master of Death.” She shrugged. “Now that I think of it, maybe that’s why Death’s plan to have a century-long show failed so spectacularly. I wasn’t collecting for myself, I was going to give both to father to resurrect the love of his life and maybe then he’d think of his children for a minute.” Persephone rolled her eyes.

They had five minutes before her Transfiguration / his Potions, and, while collecting her stack of books, she said, “Actually, telling a sad story is not why I approached you. I want to make a deal with you, as Death with a Master of Death.”

“Let’s skip class,” suggested Harry.

Persephone looked at him then slowly nodded. “Sometimes I forget that the whole school thing is a charade. Room of Requirement, in ten?”

The Room had a Ravenclaw-tower look to it, if Rowena had a preference for darker colours. Persephone was sitting beside a coffee table, pouring tea, looking nothing like Death and very much like an unusually reserved teenager.

“So, the deal,” she said once he sat on the other side. “You do what I ask of you and I fix you up when you die.”

Harry raised his eyebrows. “Isn’t the Master of Death supposed to be immortal? Even the Killing Curse doesn’t kill me.”

Persephone blinked. “Technically immortal, yes, but Avada Kedavra doesn’t harm the body, that’s the point. What about poison? Sure, you don’t die but you might experience agony in the meanwhile. And what if you are hit with a Killing Curse in front of a bunch of people?”

Harry took a sip. “What can you even do in that case?”

Persephone smiled and shifted on her chair. “I control death, I can make it so you don’t get hit with deadly curses and don’t ingest the poison: for a casual observer, it would only look as if you are simply incredibly lucky.”

“Do you do it for a lot of people?”

“I don’t get out much,” Persephone waved her hand in dismissal. “My predecessor gave plot armour, so to speak, to anyone he was interested in, often significant historical figures with interesting biographies.

My not getting out much, though, is why I want this deal. I am busy enough in my realm, I don’t have much time for this one; take your Dark Lord Sauron, for example, destroying his Horcruxes - or  _ arranging  _ the destruction of his Horcruxes - would be Death’s responsibility.”

Harry blinked. How much control Death really has over the real world?.. He shook his head. “A deal, then, is me performing certain reasonable tasks for you, with a right to refuse, and you, what, making sure that my body doesn’t die in front of witnesses or is mortally injured, so my survival might raise suspicion?”

Persephone nodded. “Words don’t really matter, we won’t be signing anything. I’ll keep to the spirit of the agreement.” She sipped her tea. “Oh, one more thing. You will need to collect the Hallows of this world first.”

Harry stared at her, incredulous. “Isn’t there a curse on the Wand?”

She leaned back in the chair. “Oh. Okay. Then maybe not ‘first’ but certainly at some point.”

“Why?” The cup clinked when Harry put it down.

“I want to stop this ridiculous contest.”

He had nothing to say to that.

For skipping Potions, Harry had detention with Fleamont who wasn’t impressed and glared at him while he cleaned cauldrons (not a usual detention for a sixth year, probably meant as an insult).

After Harry placed the last one on the shelf, he leaned on the Slughorn’s table, crossed his arms and said, “I know it’s not your fault. Harry.” It looked like Fleamont would rather swallow a bug than say his name. “I’d have never thought my father capable...” Harry would rather swallow a bug than listen to this, than cause this, this hurt to the Potter family. He wasn’t really seventeen and he could have taken care of himself. Pretended to be muggleborn but it was too late for that. “...and, for some time, I blamed you.” Fleamont sighed covered his eyes with his palm. “I’m sorry.”

God, it burned. The apology. The unnecessary hurt. Henry Potter'd decided for him, for Charlus, for Fleamont. Couldn’t Harry simply say it himself? But what then? Would Fleamont be angry again?

Harry didn’t want to.

The awful reason was, he didn’t want Fleamont to know. Three months of cold shoulders, of needle prick remarks. This, what was happening right now, meant that Fleamont (and with him the whole family) finally started to return to equilibrium, and Harry didn’t want to destroy it once again. He wanted to feel  _ real _ , to have this fake but so  _ ordinary _ a story and run with it. It was his chance to have a family, to be normal; he didn’t want to be a time-travelling grandchild. Besides, the more people knew, the more was the risk of his actual secrets unravelling.

Was that too selfish of him? Harry didn’t know.

He didn’t even know if he could have this selfishness and live with it - but damn him he was going to try.

Death was waiting in the Room of Requirement with another kettle of tea and her blue tie crooked.

“So, I thought we are going to start with the Stone,” she said before he could even shut the door properly. “My brother got it after and, apparently, there are only Gaunts left and they don’t attend Hogwarts for half a century now.” She shrugged. “Maybe they moved out of England altogether? Where did you get yours?”

Didn’t Persephone read his mind? “If it’s the same world then I know where it is,” Harry took a seat. Persephone poured him tea and raised a brow at him. “Marvolo Gaunt. Little Hangleton. But he won’t give it up without a fight-”

“And we don’t want to arouse suspicion, gotcha.” Harry understood why Rose could talk like this but where did Persephone pick this up?..

She leaned back in her chair, drumming on an armrest with her fingers. After several seconds of this, she nodded. “Since they know it’s the Stone, I’ll have to make a fake. It won’t be as good but it will do.”

“They don’t know it’s the Resurrection Stone. At least, I don’t think so?” Harry wasn’t actually sure.

“I guess they  _ could  _ forget after a thousand years… But why would they keep a useless stone?”

“It’s in a ring now, a family heirloom.” Harry interrupted. “They keep it as proof they are descendants of Slytherin. By the way, do you know if Peverells could talk to snakes? Henry Potter read me a history lecture on Parseltongue. He said we mostly got it from the other side of the family: apparently, it was slowly disappearing from Potters generation by generation.”

Death shook her head. “Don’t know a thing about Potters but both my uncle, your grand relative, and my father could talk to snakes.” She thought about it for a second. “I don’t know about my brother. I never met a snake while I was… not  _ this _ , to be honest, and now I just cheat my way through languages.

I do know that Slytherin did this grand ritual to strengthen the Parseltongue’s heredity, though. When he was a kid, it was like a secret language for him and his siblings, and he loved the idea ever since.” Persephone smiled. “It was  _ cute _ . I often looked over his shoulder when he worked, and he had this idea that magicals could have their own secret code to communicate with, to write books and letters in so no muggle could ever discover the Wixen World. Not bad for a fourteen-year-old.”

Harry blinked. Having a secret language to talk to with a friend sounded nice, not really an image of a fanatic muggle-hater, though he obviously was afraid of them - and for a good reason, witch-hunting was a real threat back then.

“So, the ring. Give me the picture, please.” Persephone leaned in, looking him in the eyes. Harry simply couldn’t raise the shields fast enough. “I warned you not to drop the protections. Okay, I’ve got it.”

Her hands were moving in front of her chest as if she was making a snowball - a snowball out of magic energy, Harry supposed. She concentrated her gaze, her thoughts, her magic and it felt like everything came in deep focus, waiting to be rotated around an object she was creating. For a second, the reality was tilting underneath Harry and then Persephone was holding out a ring with a smile on her face.

“Done,” she said. “Sorry for the… y’know,” she made a circular gesture with her hand, “the disturbance. Couldn’t use wixen magic for this.”

Harry took the ring. “So, does it work like the Resurrection Stone? I could talk to the dead?”

Persephone shrugged. “Well, the real Stone did not  _ exactly  _ work either. If a person who doesn’t know shit about necromancy uses it, it’s all just illusions they wish to see, not souls or ghosts of the dead.”

Harry swallowed. Should he even hope that the stone from his timeline was different? He really wanted to believe he saw his parents and godfather the day he went to his death, not his own attempts to deny that he was raised as a sacrifice to appease fate.

“And if I die with all the Hallows, do I… does it activate the Stone in any way?”

Persephone tilted her head. “It shouldn’t. But you don’t really  _ die _ with the Hallows because of the Master of Death thing. Nobody wants to waste time teaching someone who can drop dead any day.” She paused. “Well. I guess that’s not true. But Death doesn’t, that’s for sure.  
Why do you ask?”

Harry hesitated. It was deeply personal. It was important to him, the explanation, the fact that Dumbledore was sorry. He almost did not want to know. Almost. “After a Killing Curse hit me, mentally I travelled to this place… a train station, like a limbo. And my mentor, who was dead, talked to me there.”

Persophone listened and there was no hint of pity or, really, any other emotion on her face, rather than light curiosity. “Just a train station or any particular one?”

“King's Cross. It’s the one we get on the Hogwarts Express. Is that important?”

Persephone hummed. “Might be. I don’t think I can tell you whether it was real or not. If your mentor died recently and you wanted to talk to him, you could’ve picked him out of the crowd of souls on the way.” She shrugged. “The issue here is that I’ve got zero experience being Death’s apprentice. I don’t know in-between, only being mortal one second and being Death the next.”

Harry didn’t tell her that the person he saw died almost a year before his near-death experience. Who knows, a year could be ‘recent’.

He sighed. “I think I’ll deal with the ring on the winter holidays.”

Persephone nodded, “We are not in a hurry.”

“Will you come with me?” Harry asked when they left the room.

“Sure. I’m on a vacation anyway.” They took off towards the library. “I think I’m going to take my NEWTs this year.”

“You are such a Ravenclaw.”

“I know, right? I totally identify as one.”

They've never noticed a shiver of a Disillusionment Charm and never saw how it faded, revealing a frowning Albus Dumbledore.

**Author's Note:**

> On the Sorting:  
> Sorting Hat is an artificial intelligence thingy, it might be advanced but it can’t pass through Harry’s shields, can’t know the secrets Unspeakable hid, can only generate phrases based on the data it has. The Sorting is not _really_ important, the only thing that needs to happen is shouting a house. The Hat assigns weights to the facts it can access: the parseltongue, the need for strong mind shields, his current family (that he isn’t yet strongly tied to). If it couldn’t access anything, it might do it just on the basis that he is a Potter (Gryffindor) or, if he had a muggleborn-like surname, randomly but not Slytherin.  
> I imagine it also cares about proportion: you can’t have 30 Hufflepuffs.  
> TLDR; the Sorting Hat is just a fun tool to separate the kids into four somewhat equal groups.
> 
> On Dumbles’ appearance and overall:  
> it’s still 7-8 years before Grindewald is even active. He is 38 in this, considering 140 as an average life span, he is like late twenties. I also ‘headcanon’ (Word of God or Death of the Author?..) that he is gay and at this point has not yet given up on his love life.  
> After his break up with Grindewald, he dated some but not very serious, still very much in love in Gellert (who is not yet capital Evil at this point). Then he was busy. The duel, though, put a stop to any left hopes because he would have to either lie or tell everything to his partners who would no doubt ask about his famous achievement: beating the Dark Lord. 
> 
> Speaking of Dumbles, just look at this drawing of him: https://br.pinterest.com/pin/698339485955742298/  
> it's just... wow.)


End file.
